Hey! I've wanted to do this for sometime. The idea of Sherlock delivering a baby intrigues me so I've written a fic based on that idea. Set in the future where gay marriage is (hopefully) legal.
"Hi, John!" Alex half-sang down the phone.
"Hello, Alex. How are you doing?"
"I'm good, thank you. How would you and Sherlock like to come and see me this weekend? I'm having a barbeque on Saturday. You could stay over if you want."
A few seconds of silence passed in which Alex knew that John was wracking his brains to figure out of his best friend would be able to stand staying in a country house for a whole weekend.
"Um… I'd love to, but I'm not sure about Sherlock."
John hesitated as he said the Consulting Detective's name. Alex kept her fingers crossed, hoping that her two good friends would agree to visit her. She lost a fair bit of hope when she heard the familiar deep growling voice of Sherlock Holmes in the background.
"Tell her 'no', John. I can't think of a more boring prospect."
Alex sighed and then balled her hand into a fist. She didn't know if it was the hormonal effects of being eight months pregnant or the fact that she had lived in London with John and Sherlock for long enough that she had finally grown balls of steel.
"Put him on, John."
"Uh, I don't think that he'd –"
"Please, John. Put him on."
Alex sounded so insistent that she was sure that the former Army Doctor had handed the phone to Sherlock in half a second, for Sherlock's voice followed so shortly after that she had no time to breathe.
"No, Alex, I don't think –"
"Sherlock Holmes! You haven't been to see my house, I last saw you a year ago and I bloody well miss you! Just for one weekend –"
"It would not be –" Sherlock interrupted.
Alex wasn't having it. "One weekend! Just come and stay with me and then you can go back to your precious London." Silence. "Please, Sherlock? I've got a library, high-speed internet and plenty of land for you to gather samples and stuff from. You can bring some lab equipment if it will keep you happy. You and John can have your own rooms; it's a large house and has some antique bits and pieces. I'm also pretty sure it's haunted!" Alex was really trying to sell it to him now. "Pretty please, with a cherry on top?" she asked in a high-pitched girly tone.
Alex's plea was met with an exasperated sigh. She was sure that he was exchanging glances with John, as if the two were sending one another mental signals.
"Fine."
Alex heard a loud clunk after this affirmative word, which she assumed was John catching the phone as it was tossed towards him in annoyance.
"Hello? Sherlock? John?"
"It's me, Alex," John replied. "Yeah, we'll come down on Saturday morning if that's okay?"
"Yes, that would be fine. That gives us a couple of days to sort things out."Alex and John continued their chat for over half an hour, catching up on what they had been up to which induced many huffs and, Alex suspected, numerous eye rolls from Sherlock. He had been extremely busy lately and had just proved a ten-year-old miscarriage of justice. He had also apparently scoffed at the article written by the victim in which he sang the Consulting Detective's praises.
It had been two years since Alex moved out of 221c to the beautiful Kentish countryside. She had accumulated over half a million pounds and, during Sherlock's "death", she had met a young film producer called Joanna, with whom she had fallen in love with at first sight. Their relationship spanned two years before they moved out together and the last time she had seen Sherlock was at their wedding a year before. Alex had met Joanna when the BBC asked Alex for the rights to adapt her first and third novels and, when she and Jo hit it off, they set up a production company together. They lived just on the outskirts of Kent, which was only a couple of miles from London so their commute to work took only half an hour. Mitzie was seven years old now and had acted as a surrogate mother to two Staffordshire bull terrier puppies. Alex had also fulfilled her childhood dream of having a horse and had adopted three from the RSPCA.
The detective strongly disliked Jo at first but, like he had done with Alex, he accepted her quickly. He had also deduced that Alex was pregnant before she had even announced it by email by seeing the pictures of her on her blog. Sherlock had also noticed mood changes in her tweets and blog entries.
John had visited Alex three times throughout her pregnancy. He tried and failed to find out the sex of the baby but Alex and Jo wanted to keep it a secret. Sherlock had blurted out that the baby was female (he had somehow deduced by a photograph of Alex's six month bump on her blog), prompting John to purchase a little collection of pink clothes.
At the age of thirty, Alex was more than ready to settle and have children, although she had never thought about having a family until she had met Jo. The IVF was successful on the second attempt and she had asked John and Sherlock to be the baby's godfathers. The latter had declined gratefully – Alex was sure that the request had nauseated him somewhat.
"Are you okay, darling? Is the baby kicking seven bells out of you, again?" Jo asked her wife as she crouched awkwardly, grasping the edge of the sofa. A painful tightening had suddenly gripped her whole middle. She tried to take a long breath out but it caught in her throat and her heart rate accelerated as she tried to keep herself from keeling over from the pain.
"Oh, God!" Alex exclaimed. "I need to sit down."
Alex held onto Jo's arms as her wife eased her onto the sofa. They sat side by side in one another's arms for a few minutes. Jo rocked Alex slightly and rubbed Alex's belly, trying anything she could to ease the pain.
"You don't think its labour pain, do you?" Jo asked. "I could call the midwife."
"No, no it's fine. I think it's just Braxton Hicks," Alex explained, flattening her palm mid-air. She had experienced a few twinges over the last couple of weeks and called the midwife several times. Alex was sure that woman was getting rather sick of being called upon in the event of false alarms because she had impatiently told Alex after the fifth time to only call when her waters broke. Both Jo and Alex had agreed on a home birth and to only go to hospital if absolutely necessary.
After twenty seconds or so the pain had subsided and Alex was able to get up from the sofa to lay the cloth over the long table for the buffet.
"Jo, I don't know if I'm gonna be able to get this all ready in time. The boys will be here in an hour or so, the stuff still hasn't turned up and I just –"
"Hey, stop panicking," Jo said soothingly as she embraced Alex. The writer hugged her wife back and secretly cursed her unborn baby for making something so simple like a hug so difficult. "It's fine, I'll take the van and go with John to get the barbeque and the other bits if he's okay with that. It'll be fine, trust me!"
They locked eyes for a minute, Jo instantly noticing that Alex was on the verge of tears. Alex was only three weeks from her due date and was getting rather fed up now. They wanted to meet their baby right then and there and whilst Alex enjoyed the first six months of her pregnancy (the vomiting and cravings for peanut butter and gherkins aside); it was now just a burden.
"Okay, we'll wait till the boys arrive, you can go and get the stuff and I'll sort out the food."
Alex and Jo kissed softly and tried their best to ignore their dogs' jealous whines. After the dogs were taken to the neighbour's house for the day, as Sherlock would not be able to tolerate their presence, Alex heard a car pull into the driveway.
Just as excited as if Father Christmas himself had called on Alex as a five year old, she bounded out the door in just her socks and cursed as the shingles on drive cut into her feet. John Watson was out of the car the second it stopped. They were both seated in the back and Alex knew instantly that Sherlock's extremely kind and ever-caring brother had arranged for one of his chauffeurs to give them a lift.
The doctor's hair had turned a little greyer and was very neatly cropped. He had acquired a couple more laughter lines but he had lost a little weight since his last visit a couple of months before. He beamed warmly at Alex and hugged her enthusiastically, wincing as the bump hit him in the stomach.
"Wow, this thing's big!" he exclaimed as Alex looked at him sceptically. "Sorry, I didn't mean it like that, I'm just amazed that you're almost full term."
"Next time you come down I'll hopefully be back in shape!"
John smiled once more before he looked past Alex and greeted Jo, who was still standing facing the car. It was Sherlock whom Alex was mostly looking forward to seeing. He looked just as she remembered. Tall, dark and unforgivably handsome in his black designer suit, complete with the silk purple shirt he always looked amazing in. His hair was as short and curly as it always had been and his face still sported the alabaster complexion. She felt tatty in comparison with her maternity dress and leggings and long blonde hair in a loose bun. The only thing off-putting was the awful pout he was wearing and the way his eyes darted everywhere, deducing the driveway and house as if they were merely projects for him to work on.
"Sherlock?" Alex called innocently. She faintly heard John and Jo's chatting behind them get louder as they walked past to get to the boot of the car.
Sherlock looked at Alex – or rather scanned Alex expertly with a grim expression, placing his hands in his trouser pockets. Just metres apart, they stood still, gazing at each other. Eventually, the detective relaxed his shoulders and lifted one side of his mouth into a half-smile. It was a smile Alex had got to know well and she knew that he was always more pleased then he made out at such moments.
Taking his hands out of his pockets, he approached her slowly. His eyes alighted on her prominent bump, making Alex want to shield it, but there was absolutely no point in trying.
"Yeah, I know. I'm fat," she said, rather embarrassed given the detective's charming features.
"Hmm, I wouldn't say that."
"No?" Alex asked.
"No, not fat, just overweight. Your BMI is between thirty and thirty-one but, of course, the foetus gestating in your womb would give some people the illusion of the reason for your size to be due to weight gain, even though it is blatantly obvious that the reason is that you are eight months pregnant."
His deductions always seemed to stop the beating of Alex's heart. Even the simplest of ones Sherlock seemed to turn into a scientific diagnosis.
She continued to stare at Sherlock as he did with her. He had gathered all the data he needed from her in a matter of seconds and needed nothing further. Yet, he didn't move from her presence.
His face was soft, yet expressionless. Alex knew that only he could make the next move. She knew Sherlock didn't really want to be there and was preparing herself for hostility or worse; fake pleasantries. However, his next gesture surprised her.
His lips stretched into a full grin, friendly and inviting. Alex reciprocated and launched herself forward, seeing his lips part as she did. She knew that he was genuinely happy to see her. Groaning slightly at her weight as she fell into his arms, Sherlock caught her in time and hoisted her back into an upright position whilst they were still locked in a tight embrace.
Physical affection was never something Sherlock cared for and rarely gave. But they both needed it to break any ice.
"Good to see you again. I missed you," Alex confessed once she drew back. Sherlock nodded and gave a bashful grin. Alex knew that he would not reciprocate any words of sentiment and their hug was the best gesture she could expect from him.
